The installation of cables in buildings such as office buildings is a very important aspect of modern building construction. With the use of computers, data terminals, credit card verifiers, telecommunication systems, and the like being so commonplace in buildings, the installation of the cables needed for such systems has become an extremely important aspect of both new construction and old building renovation. Modern offices often utilize duplex wall fixtures which contain outlets for both telephones and computer networks. And, older buildings which undergo renovation for new tenants, or simply undergo modernization, must have cables installed as part of the upgrading process in order to compete for tenants.
The installation of cables is a rather labor intensive process and ordinarily requires that cables be run or "pulled" from a central closet or computer room to the locations of wall outlets. Typically, a new office building will have at least one, and perhaps two duplex outlets on each wall. Each duplex outlet would likely have both a data cable and a voice cable pulled from a central room or closet to the outlet. Thus, in a simple office having four walls, with one outlet on each of two walls, there would be two outlets requiring four cables to be pulled from the closet to the office. On a given floor in each building, there may be any number of offices, each requiring four cables. Since it is far easier to install the cables during the initial construction stage of a building, the tendency is to install more cables than will be needed, in order to create flexibility into the possible layout of the office, especially in offices designed for high density modular furniture.
Large spools of cables are generally placed in the central room, and the cable is generally pulled from the spools, through the ductwork or chase through ceiling space or raised flooring to the particular office location according to the building plan. Generally an installer will start with the farthest room first and work toward the shortest pull. However, the pulling order used by the installer usually does not coincide with the numbering order of the outlets on the plans. In other words, outlet number one may not necessarily be the first cable pulled. In fact, this would most likely be coincidence rather than intentional.
Once the cables are pulled, the ends of the cables in the offices are readily recognizable by referring to the outlets, since both on the plans and on the outlets and sometimes even the walls, the outlets are numbered for reference. This helps maintain a degree of consistency so that one can tell which outlet in a telephone system, for example, should be wired to a particular terminal on the central telephone unit.
Unfortunately, the ends of the cables in the "computer room" or "telephone closet" are generally merely cut to a length sufficient to enable connection at any location in that room or closet, and the installer moves right on to the next cable pull. This leaves a large quantity of excess cable which eventually will be cut off at the proper length. However, the ends are often not marked in any way or are simply marked with a piece of tape, so that when the telephone or computer network installer arrives to install the necessary hardware, he must determine which end in a large bundle of taped ends is associated with which outlet. This is usually a trial and error step which can be very time consuming, particularly in large closets with hundreds of cables running to different offices. Thus, even when the ends of the cables are marked in some way, the markings are often lost or mislabeled. Although a different color cable is ordinarily used for data cables than for voice cables, and this helps to reduce the selection process, much is left to trial and error in the overall process. In addition, it is not unusual for the number of outlets or the numbering of the outlets to change after plans are drawn, or even after cables are pulled, and this can contribute to confusion in the computer room and errors in the installation.
Regardless of how the cables have been pulled and identified in the past, the hardware installer has been obliged to work with a random array of numbered cables, which still had to be terminated or connected in a specific order.
Thus, a primary object of the present invention is to provide an improved method and apparatus for installing cabling in buildings.
A further object of the invention is to provide a method for installing cabling which greatly reduces the time required to properly connect cables.
Still another object of the invention is to provide a method for installing cabling which provides a cable numbering at the closet end of the cables which corresponds to the numbering of the respective cable outlets.
Yet a further object of the invention is to provide a method for installing cabling in a building which facilitates installation of the cables in an orderly manner.
Another object of this invention is to provide a method for installing cabling in a building in which the cables are arranged in a neat and orderly fashion, improving the appearance of the work and the labor costs involved in the installation.
Still a further object of the invention is to provide an apparatus for installing cabling in a building which facilitates pulling the cables in a desired sequence and enables reordering that sequence after the cables have been pulled.
Another object of the invention is to provide an apparatus for installing cabling in a building whereby cables may be pulled from spools and numbered as they are pulled.
Yet another object of the invention is to provide an apparatus for numbering cables during installation of the cables in a building, and permitting easy changing of the numbering after the cable has been pulled.
Still a further object of the invention is to provide an apparatus which enables multiple cables to be pulled to different outlets simultaneously while maintaining the desired numbering of the cables.
These and other objects and advantages of the invention will become apparent from the following description of the invention when considered with the accompanying drawings and claims.